Due to the fierce fighting that has been going on in Israel and Gaza lately, there is much keen interest in Israel and the Bible. Below are some articles on this website about Israel and the Bible:
“Should We Pray for Israel?”
“Does Modern Israel fulfill Bible Prophecy?”
“Are Restoration Prophecies About Israel Literal — Or Symbolic?”
“The Spiritual Use of ‘Israel’ in the Bible”
“Restoration Prophecies — Israel of God”
Many Christians strongly believe that modern day Israel is “God’s Chosen People,” and that Jews en masse will accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior before the end. Based on this viewpoint, they pray for modern day Israel. But, should we pray for Israel? To get the correct Biblical view in answer to this question, we need to understand and view the Old Testament in light of the New Testament, and not the other way around. People often misunderstand and mistinterpret the scriptures by doing this.
Every year, “Yom Kippur,” “the Day of Atonement” is observed by practicing Jews, Samaritans, and some Christians, on “the tenth day of the seventh month” (Leviticus 25:27). On our calendar, this day comes in either late September or early October. In 2023, it began at sundown on September 24th and ended at sundown on September 25th. This Jewish festival was very important under the Old Mosaic Law Covenant that Almighty God made with the ancient nation of Israel, as elaborated in detail in Leviticus chapter 16. “He has not done this with any other nation” (Psalm 147:19,20 NLT). Jews today “observe many other traditions” in connection with “Yom Kippur” which “go beyond what is written in Scripture” (1 Corinthians 4:6 GWT).
Critics assert that accurate predictive prophecy is impossible. However, Alexander the Great was predicted in the Bible 200 years in advance.
“Alexander of Macedon son of Philip . . . defeated Darius king of the Persians and Medes, whom he succeeded as ruler, as first of Helias. He undertook many campaigns, gained possession of many fortresses . . . So he advanced to the ends of the earth, plundering nation after nation; the earth grew silent before him, and his ambitious heart swelled with pride. He assembled very powerful forces and subdued provinces, nations and princes, and they became his tributaries . . . Alexander had reigned twelve years when he died”—1 Maccabees 1:1-7 NJB
Many who profess to be Christians strongly believe that it is their duty to be involved in politics for the good of this world. There is no doubt that many of these Christians are very sincere and well-meaning in their efforts. Should Christians participate in politics?
“If I had to do it all over again, I would avoid any semblance of involvement in partisan politics . . . An evangelist is called to do one thing, and one thing only: to proclaim the gospel.”—Billy Graham, during an interview in the later years of his life
It is popularly believed that there are many ways or paths to God. Many truly believe that one can find God through either any of such diverse paths as Christianity, or Buddhism, or Hinduism, or Islam, or Shintoism, or Confucianism, or Paganism, or Mysticism, or Sun Worship, or through their own enlightenment and path, or Native American religion, or Spiritism, or “the energy of the universe,” or New Age, or by being a good person, or through no religion at all, or through nature, or any combination of these and/or other beliefs, etc. Those who disagree with this populist idea are viewed as narrow-minded, or ignorant.
Critics have long doubted the Bible’s historicity, but archaeology has authenticate the existence of many of the people, places, things and events in the Bible. Ahaz and Rezin have been authenticated as kings of Judah and Aram, or Syria,
“Ahaz . . . reigned in Jerusalem sixteen years”—2 Kings 16:2 NIV
He is remembered most for his war against Israel (under Pekah) and Aram (Syria) (under Rezin):
“Then Rezin king of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel marched up to fight against Jerusalem and besieged Ahaz, but they could not overpower him”—2 Kings 16:5 NIV
Can we trust the Bible’s historical accuracy when it mentions a Jew named Mordecai in Esther?
“The book is a free composition, not a historical document”—Catholic Commentary
“The only character known to history is Ashasuerus”—Catholic Commentary
“Now there was at the citadel in Susa a Jew whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjamite, who had been taken into exile from Jerusalem with captives who had been exiled with Jeconiah king of Judah, when Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had exiled”—Esther 2:5,6 NASB
The Codex Sassoon is thought to have been written about 1,100 years ago.
It is the earliest surviving example of a single manuscript containing all 24 books of the Hebrew Bible with punctuation, vowels and accents.
US lawyer and former ambassador Alfred Moses bought it for the ANU Museum of the Jewish People in Tel Aviv, Israel.
” The Hebrew Bible is the most influential in history and constitutes the bedrock of Western civilisation,” Mr Moses said in a statement.
“I rejoice in knowing that it belongs to the Jewish people. It was my mission, realising the historic significance of Codex Sassoon, to see it resides in a place with global access to all people.”
The winning bid exceeded the $30.8m paid by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates in 1994 for the Codex Leicester, Leonardo da Vinci’s scientific notebook.
But it fell short of the record for a historical document sold at auction set by hedge fund manager Ken Griffin, who bought a first-edition printed copy of the US constitution for $43.2m two years ago.
The Codex Sassoon is named after a previous owner, David Solomon Sassoon, who acquired it in 1929 and assembled the largest and most important private collection of Hebrew manuscripts in the world at his home in London.
The text of the Hebrew Bible – whose 24 books make up what Christians call the Old Testament – remained in flux until the early Middle Ages, when Jewish scholars known as Masoretes began to create a body of notes that standardised it.
The Aleppo Codex, which was assembled around 930, is considered the most authoritative Masoretic text. However, damage from a fire in the Syrian city of Aleppo in 1947 means that only 295 of the original 487 pages survive today.
The Codex Sassoon, which carbon dating shows was created around 900, is missing only 12 pages, according to Sotheby’s.
“It presents to us the first time an almost-complete book of the Hebrew Bible appears with the vowel points, the cantillation and the notes on the bottom telling scribes how the correct text should be written,” Sharon Mintz, senior Jewish artefact specialist at the auction house, said in March.
Centuries of annotations and inscriptions reveal that the manuscript was sold by a man named Khalaf ben Abraham to Isaac ben Ezekiel al-Attar, who later transferred ownership to his two sons, Ezekiel and Maimon.
In the 13th Century, the codex was dedicated to a synagogue in Makisin, in north-eastern Syria.
After the town was destroyed by either by the Mongols later in the 13th Century or by the Timurids at the start of the 15th Century, the manuscript was entrusted for safekeeping to Salama ibn Abi al-Fakhr. It then disappeared in history for 500 years.
The Codex Sassoon’s most recent owner was Swiss investor Jacqui Safra, who bought it for £2m ($2.5m) at auction in London in 1989.”
Macro-evolution theory is the gradual change from one species to another over that is asserted to take place long periods of time. But why does the the theory of Macro-evolution constantly get revised? Scientists report they have revived an ancient worm, and have discovered that, “some processes of evolution are deeply conserved,” as reported in a CNN ARTICLE, of July 28,2023. Here is the article:
“Scientists have revived a worm that was frozen 46,000 years ago — at a time when woolly mammoths, sabre-toothed tigers and giant elks still roamed the Earth.
The roundworm, of a previously unknown species, survived 40 meters (131.2 feet) below the surface in the Siberian permafrost in a dormant state known as cryptobiosis, according to Teymuras Kurzchalia, professor emeritus at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden and one of the scientists involved in the research.
Scientists have revived a ‘zombie’ virus that spent 48,500 years frozen in permafrost
Organisms in a cryptobiotic state can endure the complete absence of water or oxygen and withstand high temperatures, as well as freezing or extremely salty conditions. They remain in a state “between death and life,” in which their metabolic rates decrease to an undetectable level, Kurzchalia explained.
“One can halt life and then start it from the beginning. This a major finding,” he said, adding that other organisms previously revived from this state had survived for decades rather than millennia.
Five years ago, scientists from the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems in Soil Science in Russia found two roundworm species in the Siberian permafrost.
One of the researchers, Anastasia Shatilovich, revived two of the worms at the institute by simply rehydrating them with water, before taking around 100 worms to labs in Germany for further analysis, transporting them in her pocket.
After thawing the worms, the scientists used radiocarbon analysis of the plant material in the sample to establish that the deposits had not been thawed since between 45,839 and 47,769 years ago.
But still, they didn’t know whether the worm was a known species. Eventually, genetic analysis conducted by scientists in Dresden and Cologne showed that these worms belonged to a novel species, which researchers named Panagrolaimus kolymaenis.
Researchers also found that the P. kolymaenis shared with C. elegans — another organism often used in scientific studies — “a molecular toolkit” that could allow it to survive cryptobiosis. Both organisms produce a sugar called trehalose, possibly enabling them to endure freezing and dehydration.
Belching lakes, mystery craters, ‘zombie fires’: How the climate crisis is transforming the Arctic permafrost
“To see that the same biochemical pathway is used in a species which is 200, 300 million years away, that’s really striking,” said Philipp Schiffer, research group leader of the Institute of Zoology at the University of Cologne and one of the scientists involved in the study. “It means that some processes in evolution are deeply conserved.”
And, Schiffer added, there are other actionable insights which can be gleaned by studying these organisms.
“By looking at and analyzing these animals, we can maybe inform conservation biology, or maybe even develop efforts to protect other species, or at least learn what to do to protect them in these extreme conditions that we have now,” he told CNN.”